On Some Ships, Musical Lineup Goes First Class

September 22, 1985|By William A. Davis, Boston Globe

In the cruise ship business these days, the sharp, cutting edge of competition is very often the soft, sweet sound of music.

Besides trying to outdo each other with attractive prices, drastically discounted air add-ons and more deluxe staterooms, cruise lines are also luring passengers on board with impressive musical programs. These programs feature distinguished orchestras and well-known singers and musicians performing every kind of music from classical to country and western.

Last season, Norwegian Caribbean Line staged a hugely successful jazz festival aboard its Norway, the world's largest passenger ship. NCL is organizing another jazz festival this season, one larger and longer than last year's and billed as ''The World's Greatest Floating Jazz Festival.''

The festival will last four weeks, from Oct. 5 to Oct. 27, starting on the Norway and shifting successively each week to one of the other three NCL ships: Starward, Southward and Skyward. Among the jazz festival performers will be Woody Herman, Mel Torme and Dizzy Gillespie.

''There will be regular performances every night but informal jazz sessions all the time,'' said an NCL spokesperson, ''and plenty of chances to meet and talk with the musicians -- that's what jazz fans really love.''

One-week jazz cruises on the 2,000-plus passenger Norway are priced from $1,195, double occupancy; on the other three NCL ships, from $975. All four will sail from the port of Miami on a fall and winter schedule of seven-day cruises, stopping at various Caribbean and Mexican ports.

Aboard Paquet French Cruises 550-passenger Mermoz the sounds are classical rather than cool. Now in its 17th year, the line's popular ''Music Festival at Sea'' will take place Jan. 9-22.

The festivals are held alternately in the Caribbean and the Mediterranean. The Mermoz will sail from Miami through the islands with stops -- and concerts on board and ashore -- at Cartagena, Port au Prince and other Caribbean ports. Guest artists include pianist Byron Janis, flutist James Galway, trumpet player Maurice Andre and vocalist Cy Coleman.

The festival program also includes regular lectures by musicologist Dr. Karl Haas. As with the jazz festival, there will be numerous open rehearsals and impromptu concerts where musicians and fans can mix and mingle.

The three-week cruise is priced from $3,380. One of the older ships operating in the Caribbean, the Mermoz was recently given a $10 million stem- to-stern facelift.

This season Sitmar Cruises, which operates 10-12-day Caribbean, Mexican Riviera and trans-canal cruises from Port Everglades and Los Angeles, is launching a ''Showtime'' program with a celebrity entertainer on every cruise. Performers include comedians George Burns, Phyllis Diller and David Brenner, and singers Leslie Uggams, Robert Merrill, Cab Calloway and Helen Reddy. Sitmar is also staging its own on-board game show called ''Treasure Quest'' with selected passengers on each cruise competing for $20,000 prizes -- a total of $1 million in all, including a single $100,000 grand prize.

The prices of 10-day cruises start at $1,515 per person.

Aboard the Mississippi and Ohio River paddle wheelers Delta Queen and Mississippi Queen the music is always native to the shores of the rivers, which can mean New Orleans style Dixieland jazz, country and western, bayou Cajun, bluegrass, ragtime and even swing.

From Thanksgiving to Christmas this year, there will be a Cajun theme aboard the Delta Queen, with a series of ''Zydeco'' bands, consisting of Louisiana fiddlers, drummers and accordian players; and, on the Mississippi Queen in March a 13-piece orchestra will produce the classic big band sounds of Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey, Duke Ellington and Harry James.

A one-week cruise on the Mississippi Queen ranges in price from $805 to $3,000 and on the Delta Queen from $1,295 to $2,450.

Glenn Miller, Harry James and the other great Big Bandsmen are gone but the bands they founded continue -- and sound the way they always did.

This season, the Miller and James bands, along with those of Duke Ellington and Artie Shaw, will perform during Caribbean and trans-Panama Canal cruises aboard Royal Viking Line's Viking Sea and Viking Sky. Bands will change ships with each cruise, but each will sail with a big band.

Rates for a Royal Viking 10-day Panama Canal cruise start at $1,720.

The latest addition to the North American cruise ship fleet, and the largest purpose-built cruise ship afloat is Carnival Cruise Lines' brand new 1,400-passenger, $170-million Holiday. (Norway and the QE2 are larger but were originally built as trans-Atlantic liners.)

The Holiday has a vast, six-tiered night club that can hold more than 1,000 people. The entertainment presented will be similarly out-scale -- lush and lavishly mounted Las Vegas-style revues.

The Holiday will sail the Caribbean from Miami year-round. This season, the price of a one-week Caribbean cruise starts at $945.